Saturday, May 29, 2010

Eurovision 2010

I am watching this in the comfort of my living room. My favourite act so far is from Turkey, a band called maNga.

Last year, I was watching this in Hamburg together with my colleagues and the year before in Southampton with me exchanging messages with Song Yia on msn judging the acts. This shows how fast time flies.

The Eurovision song contest is now in its 55th year! It was the platform that launched the career for Abba when they won for Sweden. Every year, European countries would be represented by a music act to battle for the crown. The winners are based on votes and you can't vote for your home country. (That's the rules!) The winning country gets to host the following years event. It is the largest live music event shown with over 120 million viewers.

This years highlight included a stage crasher during Spain's performance which granted Spain another opportunity to perform again after the final 25th act. France and Germany had upbeat tunes while Iceland and Ireland had standing ovations.

The show's most iconic part with almost a cult status is the results announcement section in the end. Each country eligible to vote in this event will have their mini slot announcing the results of their local vote. It is also interesting to see that neighbouring countries will often vote for each other. (eg. UK voting for Ireland). Will be interesting to see who will grab this year's glory.

Being nostalgic again, the first time I ever I heard about Eurovision was when Ruslana of Ukraine won with the following upbeat tune in 2004. Still a good performance in my records.

Well, enough for this time while I continue watching the remainder of the show.